Members of the public will be invited to weigh in on state proposal

The city council plans a special council meeting to discuss the state’s proposed redesign of Asbury Park’s Main Street, with one council member asking that the session be held by September.

Called a “road diet” the state plan would reduce Main Street from a four lane thoroughfare down to two with bike paths on both sides and a two-way turning lane in the center. The plan includes the entire length of Main Street in Asbury as well as Deal Lake Drive from Main Street to Grand Avenue.

“It’s a complicated issue, there’s not enough time to hear the presentation and address the public’s concerns in a regular [city council] workshop session,” said City Manager Terence Reidy at last week’s council meeting as to why the matter requires a special council session.

At the special meeting, specifics of the plan will be presented by Donald Sammet, director of redevelopment and planning for the city, and Joe Cunha, the city’s engineering director. Members of the public will be invited to weigh in on the issue.

While the special meeting has not been scheduled to date, Councilman John Moor hopes the meeting will take place sometime in September.

“If not sooner,” he said.

Cunha would like to see the meeting take place “within the next two months,” he said. “[We’re] shooting for August sometime between the other [regularly scheduled city council] meetings, ideally.”

“It is something the state is eager to implement,” Reidy said.

Concerns were raised during last week’s council meeting about businesses along Main Street and their current use of the far right lanes to park trucks while taking deliveries during business hours.

Moor spoke in opposition to the plan.

“It’s totally ridiculous,” he said. “Has every business been surveyed?”

At the time the state originally brought the idea before past council several years ago, businesses were given notice, according to Councilman John Loffredo.

“A long time ago – they may need to be notified again,” said Councilwoman Sue Henderson.

Jackie Pappas, executive director of the Asbury Park Chamber of Commerce, will serve as the point person for the Asbury business community for the arrangement of the special council meeting.

“We are looking at how to improve traffic flow and pedestrian safety in that area,” said Steve Schapiro, a spokesman for the state Department of Transportation [DOT]. “A dedicated turning lane helps with traffic flow as cars turning won’t block the through lane,” he said.

Redesigning roads to include different means of transportation, called “complete streets,” is also part of the state’s plan, along with the overall goal of improving pedestrian traffic, Shapiro said.

The DOT does take the concerns of individual municipalities into consideration during the concept development process, according to Shapiro.

“We always work with communities. We will work with officials in the local community as well,” he said.

While the DOT is still in the early stages of the plan, they typically hold public meetings called “information centers” on large projects like the one being proposed for Route 71 in Asbury Park, Shapiro said.

After the concept development stage of the project, preliminary engineering and finalization of the design will occur, at which point any part of the roadway that needs to be rehabilitated will be taken into consideration before the state ultimately puts contracts out to bid, according to Shapiro.

Final implementation of the plan is still “a few years away,” he said.